


Five

by fallen_sparrow



Category: How to Get Away with Murder
Genre: Gen, Yuletide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-19
Updated: 2014-12-19
Packaged: 2018-03-02 06:32:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,477
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2802923
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fallen_sparrow/pseuds/fallen_sparrow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A reflection on the Keating Five at the start of the semester.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Five

**Author's Note:**

  * For [thedeadparrot](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thedeadparrot/gifts).



Wes Gibbins applies to Middleton’s law school and gets waitlisted without an interview. He sort of expected it. He’s applying from a state school, with a high GPA and good recommendations but without the academic rigor of all the other ivy league students that normally attend Middleton. His advisor tells him that it’s not the end of the world, and that students can get accepted from the waitlist but also advises him to take the scholarship from the law school attached to his alma mater.

So when he hears, two days before the semester starts, that Middleton’s had a last minute drop out, he hesitates before accepting the admissions offer. For one it’s in Pennsylvania, and he’s just taken out a lease on an apartment near his new school. And for another, it’d mean packing up and moving several states away in two days.

But Wes doesn’t have a lot physical possessions and most of them are still in boxes on the floor of his apartment. He calls his adviser who had mentioned that his daughter needed somewhere to live for the semester, and sublets the apartment to her in a matter of hours. Then he buys a bus ticket to Middleton.

It should feel impulsive but Wes keeps his head cool and tells himself that no one has to know that he’s the waitlist kid.

He spent his childhood feeling out of place in the tiny, white, town where he grew up, and he figures that at least at Middleton he’ll be surrounded by future lawyers. He might not be the one vacationing in the Hampton’s every summer, but he’s fairly smart and that should matter for something.

* * *

It’s the first day of Criminal Justice 101 and Asher Millstone wishes he had a better seat. Not that he wants to be in the front row but he’s stuck between two other guys and one of them is trying to talk to him. Plus he’s still a little hungover from last night and he had forgotten to grab a painkiller before class.

A couple of his dad’s old friends had invited him out for drinks at some bar. Of course the Judge’s friends weren’t really interested in more than welcoming him to the club - the esteemed profession, one had said, but after he’d gone to one of the clubs, filled with a bunch of drunk undergrads and stayed there half the night.

In his first class, he’d shook hands with the professor, another man who knew and respected his father. Whatever. His dad was a judge in Pennsylvania so of course everyone at Middleton knew him.

But Asher didn’t want to be a judge. He wanted to be up on the stand, shouting down the prosecutor, and earning $2000 an hour from his clients. A couple of his buddies from Harvard were doing MBAs and he was pretty much set to get their business as soon as he had passed the bar. All in all it would probably be a pretty sweet deal. He’d do a couple of high profile cases and then settle down into corporate law.

He actually thought that might be too boring - he’d been captain of the debate team in college and liked to argue - but whatever. First he had to get through school. And really everyone said law school was more of a party than college anyways. He was grabbing lunch with a couple of guys he knew from undergrad and figured they’d probably introduce him to things.

* * *

Michaela Pratt had expected to spend her first night as a law student in the library, getting a head start on studying. Professor Keating’s original assignment hadn’t been too challenging and Michaela wanted to make sure that her classes stayed that way.

What she hadn’t been expecting to was head back to her apartment and compile a portfolio on an actual case in preparation for Professor Keating’s class the next day.

Michaela had told herself that her apartment was not going to be a study space - but apparently she was breaking that rule already. Her printer was whirring in the background, printing out pages of the files that she had to read before she went to sleep tonight. She also had picked out a couple of textbooks that she figured would help define several of the terms she was unfamiliar with.

Her phone beeped with a text from Aiden, but Michaela just turned off the spring. She had told him she was going to study, and really, this was studying. How she acted during this case would determine if she got to work with Professor Keating. And Michaela knew that Annalise Keating was the boss to have at Middleton. Any aspiring criminal defense lawyer who worked with Keating got any internship they wanted over the summer and was snapped up by law firms after graduation.

And Michaela was going to be one of those four students. She had spent her entire undergraduate career preparing for law school and had spent the entire summer preparing for her classes.

Aiden texted her again, and this time Michaela saw the words “good luck” on the screen. She didn’t need luck. Luck had nothing to do with this.

She quickly outlined her response in her head, before opening up her laptop and starting to type.

* * *

Laurel sized up the other four students Professor Keating had called at the end of class. Of course the front row girl was one of them. Michaela looked pleased but not surprised at her success. Whatever, Laurel knew she was good, but she also seemed like the kind of person who became a lawyer to be successful. Whatever that really meant.

There was the legacy kid - the son of some judge. He looked like a douche and he probably was. Laurel had sort of figured he was there because of the Harvard logo on his backpack and because of his father but maybe there was something more if he’d been chosen.

The other guy looked a little bit like the male version of Michaela, with an extra layer of arrogance. He didn’t seem like old money but he had a kind of polish. Judging from his smirk in Michaela’s direction, he was going to try and prove his intelligence at every turn. No, more like cleverness, he had that sort of arrogance and street smarts that clashed.

And waitlist guy. Laurel had felt sufficiently bad after Keating had yelled at her for interrupting the kid. But he was an unexpected choice. Clearly his embarrassing first day hadn’t turned Keating against him. Actually now that Laurel had apologized to him after class, she thought she might like him. He seemed like the only other one who might want to be a lawyer for more than the money, or the prestige.

That was the thing, Laurel knew that the others were cut throat, but she didn’t know how much yet. By the way a couple of them were eyeing Wes though, she thought that it was a sort of alpha predator thing. The strongest eats the weak. They had all been chosen but that didn’t mean they weren’t competing with each other still.

But Laurel wasn’t worried. She didn’t feel the same need to always be right. The others might not be able to take being wrong, but she could. She wasn’t going to be so sure of herself that she’d break so easily.

* * *

Connor knew it was all over. Professor Keating’s congratulations said it all. He was the one here willing to go however far to get the job done. Yeah the others were smart, or well connected, or somehow really lucky, but he was the one who could win the case.

That’s what being a lawyer was about - being the best. Of all the others, he figured he knew what Keating meant the most when she said she didn’t care if her client was innocent or guilty. It was about winning and it was about doing it first.

He was a competitive guy, sure, but what was wrong with that? He’d had to win his way here. Boarding school with a scholarship, undergrad with a scholarship, and then with the money he’d made as a consulting intern over the summer, law school without loans. If anyone thought that the competition ended with admission they were wrong.

The thing is, people seemed to think he minded what they said about him. They’d all looked a little scandalized when he’d made a comment about not kissing and telling. But didn’t they know that the only way to win was to play dirty. This wasn’t a fair fight. This wasn’t about justice, it was about knowing how to be better than the prosecutor. And for those who weren’t willing to lie a little, or use their own talents to their own advantage were going to lose.

**Author's Note:**

> What I tried to do here was reflect on the five at the beginning of the series. They've come so far - and its interesting for me to try and think about how what we've learned about them over the first half of the season informs what was going on in their heads in the first episode. It's just 5 mini character studies, but it was fun to try and get imagine that first episode in a new light.


End file.
